I see this as a battle of the Germans. Although both of them are relatively competent off road...this is a matter of brand for me. I dont really care for SUV's, I find that the Porsche is a bit better. Plus, the GTS doesnt look half bad, and has much more of a presence. Over here you see a lot of Tourage's...the Cayenne it is.

I apologize that the Pathfinder doesn't really fit into this poll...it was a last-minute inclusion when I realized that the Escalade Hybrid is officially an '09 model and I had to look for something to take its place. Though I think it's a pretty good truck regardless.

I, too, went for the Cayenne. The Touareg 2 looks really great and has a better interior than the Cayenne, but the Cayenne's '08 updates were really effective across the board. I mean:

V6: No longer shamefully slow, and the cheapest Porsche to bootV8 S: Improved power and fuel economy for very little extra money over the old 4.5V8 GTS: One of the only SUVs that I really want to ownTurbo: To me, the undeniable king of the SUVs. Very expensive but you also got top-notch off-road performance and road/track performance that's on the level of a very good sport sedan.

I've been one of those people that have loved the Cayenne all along. Even when people said it was a travesty to the Porsche name, I still thought it was a great SUV. But then something ruined it for me a couple weeks back. I was waiting for a parking space at the mall, and I watched much to my horror, a woman load up her three kids, and all their gear into a Cayenne. Now I can accept Porsches being the cars of trophy wives, but the transportation of choice for the soccer mom? It just made me hate it, and even the GTS hasn't gone far enough to redeem the Cayenne in my eyes. Yeah, I'm being stupid, and I realize that, but I just don't feel the same way about the Cayenne anymore.

So it came down to the classy, understated Touareg, and the big, flashy Lexus for me. In the end I went with the Lexus. I felt it was a better Luxury SUV, and you can't really go wrong with the legendary LC's underpinnings. I also happen to think it has a great interior.